I of course reject the rest of your hypothetical; but the answer is, yeah, if that’s the choice, then I’d support the one who’s against decriminalization. Again, let me stress that I think you’re wrong to flatly rule out what seems like an utterly plausible third option; it seems entirely possible for someone to manage to get both decisions right; seems to me you’re just setting up a classic false dilemma.
But if you’re saying that we live in a world where none of the candidates who’ve come out against decriminalization are capable of doing right by the guy in the article? That seems needlessly bleak and unrealistic; but if I’m for some reason playing along with your hypothetical for the sake of argument, well, then, okay, you’ve got my answer. Out of curiosity: if, for the sake of argument, the binary choice instead involved open borders, which would you pick?
I actually feel that I am describing reality. I do not see a reason why anyone would be extremely forceful in ensuring that the act of crossing the border without authorization is a crime that comes with it incarceration and family separation.
It’s like saying you want someone who will do right by someone like Emmett Till, but is supportive of Jim Crow laws. There is no overlap in those Venn Diagrams.
Tell you what, you find me a candidate that is for incarceration and family separation of asylum seekers, and would have also done right by Omar Ameen, and then we can discuss the plausibility of your third option.
Huh, funny that you should object to such a binary choice after giving such much judgement to the candidates that were required to make such a binary choice.
I’m giving you far more leeway than you gave the candidates, in that you are welcome to explain your choice, and the reasons and exceptions to your choices.
But, just so that we are on the same page, if the choice for you is to lock up families and separate them from their children, often never to be seen again, and to also deport people like Ameen to die in a country they never knew, or not to do those things, you would choose the former?
You’d have to define what you are meaning by open borders here. Many of those who are as dead set against immigration as you are consider allowing anyone to come in to be open borders, and there are others who would consider open borders to have no border control whatsoever.
I’m of the opinion that we need more people in this country. I see that there are people that want to come to this country. I figure, as long as racists and bigots don’t get in the way, that situation will sort itself out to everyone’s benefit. If you are born here, you are more likely to become a criminal than if you are an immigrant, you are more likely to use govt services, and you are less likely to have your kids go to college and have successful careers. I really don’t get the hatred that people have for immigrants that they are willing to commit atrocities in order to keep them from coming here to help us to make this a better place.
But, if you are asking me whether we should continue to incarcerate legitimate asylum seekers and refugees, to deport mentally and physically ill people to a country where they will die horribly, as well as sending back people to face violence that they fled from, or the other binary choice of having no border control whatsoever, I’d pick the latter.
As a similar question, would you rather have no trespassing laws that said that if you set foot on someone else’s property you would go to jail and lose your children, or would you rather have no trespassing laws at all? If you are for the draconian trespassing laws, do you think that your attitude would change at all if you knew someone who was incarcerated, charged, and lost their children because they stepped into their neighbor’s yard while escaping from a home invasion?
This is only a binary choice because you are insisting that it is. You say that if someone supports decriminalizing border crossing then you cannot support them, no matter their reasons, even if in every other way you feel that they are a far better candidate than their opponent. When you choose to be a one issue voter like that, you force yourself into such binary choices, no one else puts you into that position but yourself.
I know that this is in the pit and all, and as such, is not the most suitable place for a civil conversation, but I am curious as to the reason that you have that you feel so strongly about this? I am a pragmatic person, and the choices that I make are those that I feel further my goals, and I project that onto others, and make the assumption that they too have goals that they are working towards, and the decisions that they make are in an effort to reach them. What will be accomplished, what goal of yours will be achieved, by being able to lock up people, and take away their families, for nothing more than crossing a border without authorization?
I mean, you get that some folks who are — today — in fact in the running to be the Democratic nominee aren’t in favor of decriminalization, right? Help me out, here: what, exactly, do you think of them?
As I’ve said before, when faced with that binary choice, they (a) could’ve kept their hands down, and (b) explained that, while they weren’t for decriminalization, they’d keep it on the books as a crime and enforce it in a less draconian manner; and if that’s asking too much of them, I’d be all ears if they instead later explained that they raised their hands at the debate because they “were required to make such a binary choice” then, but now want to clarify that, heh, no, of course they’d still keep it on the books as a crime.
They’ve got that leeway now. I’m listening.
Well, yeah. I figure that you would, too, if we were talking about other offenses; am I correct? If so, the question is whether we disagree about this offense.
But you’re introducing a key difference to make it into that ‘binary’ choice.
You’re proposing two choices:
no trespassing laws at all; or
if you set foot on someone else’s property you would go to jail.
I’d propose three:
no trespassing laws at all; or
if you set foot on someone else’s property you would go to jail; or
if you so set foot, well, you might wind up going to jail for that.
To the best of my knowledge, we in fact opt for #3 right here in the real world. No, honest, we do; it’s not a binary choice between #1 and #2, it’s entirely possible for something to be a crime but not get enforced in some no-exceptions way: maybe, sometimes, there’s no criminal penalty at all, just removal; but maybe there’s a fine; and maybe there’s some time behind bars.
Isn’t that, as you put it, “describing reality”? And isn’t it #3, not #1 or #2?
And if I’m right, and we (a) don’t decriminalize trespassing, but (b) don’t insist on some kind of You Would Go To Jail response — well, then, why not here, too?
We sometimes lock up mere trespassers; they sometimes get separated from their families. Heck, even if illegal border crossings got decriminalized, folks could still sometimes face deportation while their kids don’t, and — what then?
Well, in general, I believe that open borders would doom the country, and I suspect that anyone who loudly declares for decriminalization is — well, is possibly telling the truth, and will stop there; but is possibly looking to push things plenty further in the direction of open borders (and, well, possibly all the way there). But I already think the decriminalization crowd is wrong in their own right, even if I’m concerned that they’ll go on to get it, uh, wronger; and I’d likewise think they were wrong if we were talking about trespassing and they picked #1 over #2 instead of opting for #3.
(And it’s not just trespassing; take, say, perjury: imagine a candidate for office said that it shouldn’t be a crime at all, that we should take Option #1 because we don’t want to take Option #2, and that it’s a binary choice because there’s no Option #3. What would you make of that candidate’s goals and wisdom?)
As an aside: picture two guys who present themselves at the border, asking to be let in: say one makes his case, and we decide, actually, yes, we think it’d be best if you were allowed in; and say the other makes his case, and we decide, well, no, based on what we’ve learned, we think it’d be in our best interest if you stayed the hell out. That’s the whole point, isn’t it? We really do let some people in, and in fact decide that it’d be better to keep some people out?
(And it doesn’t even have to be as binary as all that? Like, there’s an in-between category of people for whom we say, okay, we’ve decided that you can stay here for this long and no longer, right?)
So what does it actually mean for Guy #2 to receive that pronouncement from the United States and illegally cross the border anyway? We’ve decided it’d be bad for the country to let them in, and then they come in, and we’ll 100% waive the ability to bring criminal charges against them for that, no exceptions, we’re going to opt for #1 because we can’t okay #2 — and we for some reason rule out #3?
Why would I sign on for that last part? I see no reason to rule out #3. I figured the whole reason we screen them is because we’re taking the interests of our country exactly that seriously, and I figured the whole reason we’re doing #3 is — well, because we’re taking it exactly that seriously. (Not so seriously that we’d go full-on #2; but we don’t have to choose between #1 and #2; we can choose #3. Wasn’t #3 Barack Obama’s position? Wasn’t it Hillary Clinton’s? Isn’t it Joe Biden’s?)
This thread has veered wildly off-topic. For a Doper to explain why he might vote for Trump IS on topic. If the issue of immigration weighs more heavily in the Doper’s mind than …
having a President who believes Putin over his own Intelligence services,
revealing state secrets publicly, or in private to an enemy, out of ignorance, or because the President is in effect an agent of the the foreign enemy,
appointing a Sec Education whose agenda calls for deliberate deterioration of public schools,
increasing the fiscal deficit in prosperous times to run up the wealth of the super-rich at the expense of 99% of Americans,
looking the other way while an American (green-card) journalist is assassinated in Turkey,
abandoning in ally in the Syrian War against all advice and for no apparent reason (except possibly that the Turkish President had blackmail material against Potus),
calling the most distinguished American news sources “enemies of the people”,
firing advisor after advisor until being surrounded only by sycophants and crooks,
prohibiting government scientists from practicing science,
repealing scores of regulations aimed at making workplaces safer, protecting the environment, and protecting consumers,
… then I suppose Immigration is what he should talk about.
But even in this strange Through-the-looking-glass world where that single issue outweighs Trump’s lies and crimes, we’ve veered away from reality. TOWP has constructed a strawman -vs- strawman fantasy. None of the Democratic candidates support “open borders.” And Trump certainly doesn’t adhere to TOWP’s stance on Immigration.
@ TOWP - Start a thread about immigration policy, and you might find me taking your side, at least on parts of the debate. But we’re not debating Immigration here. We’re debating Trump’s policies.
Read articles like the following and answer Yes or No. Is this the immigration policy you want?
When you read these articles, remember that we are speaking of refugees. In general these are not people who would rather earn $8 an hour than $2 an hour. These are people that would rather Live than Die.